Greg Carey

Many of us already knew it, but Sen. Richard Lugar's defeat in the Indiana Republican primary puts things into stark relief: In 2012 any vote for a Republican is a vote for crazy. Any vote. Any Republican. No matter how sane the Republican, it's a vote for crazy.

One commonly hears, especially in church, that Jesus routinely transgressed the Torah, the law of Israel. Indeed, at least one New Testament writer agreed, saying that Jesus "abolished the law with its commandments and ordinances" (Ephesians 2:15). So what about Jesus? Did he observe the Torah like most other Jews...

A sermon delivered in Lancaster Theological Seminary's Santee Chapel, April 11, 2012

One

Jesus' body.

In Bethany an anonymous woman empties an alabaster vial of pure nard -- very costly, Mark insists -- and just pours it over Jesus' head. It looks like an anointing, a most lavish one indeed....

John Dominic Crossan's new book, "The Power of Parable: How Fiction by Jesus Became Fiction about Jesus," may spark controversy among some churchgoing readers. However, for readers who aspire to take the Gospels seriously, Crossan has some important things to say.

This book weaves together two major...

You'd already written "Writing to God: 40 Days of Praying with My Pen." What led you to develop a "Writing to God: Kids' Edition"?

Rachel Hackenberg: The idea for the "Kids' Edition" was a collaboration between myself and the publisher. It's the logical "next step" to...

The New Testament includes frequent references to Jesus' death as a means of salvation. John's Gospel refers to Jesus as "the lamb of God who takes away the world's sin" (1:29), and Revelation takes up the same image. Hebrews describes Jesus as setting aside sin through the sacrifice of his...

According to Mark's Gospel, Jesus begins his public work with a proclamation. After his baptism by John and his temptation in the wilderness, Jesus "came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of God, and saying, 'The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is near: repent, and believe the gospel'"...

This is the third entry in a three-part series. The earlier posts are here and here.

Perhaps you're acquainted with a Bible prophecy movement buff, the sort of person who visits the Christian bookstore to purchase books about the end-times. She even may sport one of...

This is the second entry in a three-part series. Part one is here.

This might come as a surprise to many, but Revelation's interpreters have arrived at a general consensus regarding why John wrote the Apocalypse, particularly the circumstances surrounding Revelation's composition. Two aspects of Revelation provide the...

Readers almost always gravitate to the same question. Why do Simon and Andrew, then James and John after them, abandon everything to follow Jesus? Mark leaves no doubt as to the immediacy of their response. Seeing Simon and Andrew casting for fish, Jesus says, "Follow...

This is the first installment of a three-part series.

We've survived Harold Camping. We survived Y2K, albeit with less distress than our ancestors survived Y1K. The world has survived end-time predictors as diverse as Billy Graham, William Miller and Jonathan Edwards. Now we face the purported final year of the...

In their forthcoming book Hijacked: Responding to the Partisan Church Divide, Mike Slaughter and Charles E. Gutenson (with help from Robert P. Jones) call Christians, especially evangelicals like themselves, to passionate and charitable engagement with the public sphere. In an age in which passion and charity rarely hold...

When it comes to the matter of Jesus' death, Christians typically insist upon his innocence. Since many Christians believe in Jesus' sinlessness, it stands to reason that Jesus committed no acts worthy of his execution. Moreover, Christian theology has expended enormous energy, and rightly so, in explaining how a tragedy...

It's not rare to encounter people who claim that Paul "invented" Christianity. The basic idea is that Jesus taught a pure and ethical form of Judaism that focused on God and gracious living, while Paul developed a religion that worshiped Jesus rather than God. Though this idea literally makes no...

In previous posts I reflected on early Christians' passion to keep in touch with one another and on the diversity of early Christian communities. In this final entry I shall reflect on women's contributions to the movement.

Some readers may find it surprising to learn that...

Ezekiel speaks compellingly to the current situation in the United States. But is the prophet's message true?

Precise Diagnosis

The society the prophet addresses suffers from a severe lack of perspective. It knows God's standards. These appear in the verses our Lectionary passes...

In an earlier post I reflected on how the earliest groups of Christians built community and stayed in touch with one another despite the challenges of communication in the ancient world. In this post I will address the diversity we encounter in those earliest churches.

Obviously, the "first"...

Matthew 16:21-28 confronts us with the gap between Jesus' gruesome fate and our own modest discipleship. Jesus' verbs say it all. Deny the self, take up the cross, follow Christ. Moreover, only in losing one's life -- the primary meaning of apollymi...

During the first session of introductory New Testament courses, I often invite students to imagine a different world. After introductions, the distribution of the syllabus and other preliminaries, students ponder: Imagine a world in which the average life expectancy for women is 25 or 30 years, where men's average life...

Tennessee Baptist pastor Joe Nelms recently offered the opening prayer before NASCAR's Federated Auto Parts 300, thanking God for "my smoking hot wife." Nelms' clever allusion to "Talledega Nights" notwithstanding, this inappropriate use of public prayer is symptomatic of a larger disorder among evangelicals -- masculinity compensation disorder....